For family of '9/11 baby' emotions of day are mixed

Published 2:00 pm, Saturday, September 10, 2011

Marc and Theresa Myers with their children Blake, Brittnie and Brookelyn, born on Sept. 11, 2001. Photo by Tim Fischer/Midland Reporter-Telegram

Marc and Theresa Myers with their children Blake, Brittnie and Brookelyn, born on Sept. 11, 2001. Photo by Tim Fischer/Midland Reporter-Telegram

Photo: Tim Fischer

For family of '9/11 baby' emotions of day are mixed

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Mark and Theresa Myers have slightly different memories of the day their youngest child, Brookelyn, was born.

Already set for a cesarean section because the baby was breach, Theresa went into labor two days before her scheduled surgery. Brookelyn was born at 12:04 a.m. the following day.

Tired and emotional from the birth of their child, Mark and Theresa both remember watching the TV nine hours later, even if their accounts of the details don’t match up.

“We were pretty much up all night,” Mark said. “At 9 a.m. (Theresa) was going to sleep. I was sitting in a chair holding (Brookelyn). I turned the TV on and watched the second one hit live.”

Though her husband thought she was asleep, Theresa said she remembers lying in the hospital bed and watching the second plane crash into the World Trade Center building in New York City.

“I just remember seeing everything going on and being sad,” she said, adding she stopped allowing family and friends to turn on the TV in her hospital room. “No TV, no radio — it was on everything. (Mark) would have to turn it on when I went to sleep, because emotionally I couldn’t handle it.”

Most Americans remember where they were and what they were doing on Sept. 11, 2001 — and almost all parents can recall the details of the day their child was born. For this Midland family, the two events collided and in one day brought incredible joy for a new addition to their family and momentous sadness for a wounded nation. Ten years later, the Myers family still feels the impact of that day.

In the hours after the Sept. 11 attacks, Mark and Theresa said the hospital was quiet and somber. Doctors and nurses continued to check on patients while keeping updated on the news by watching TVs turned on in patient rooms.

Mark remembers the doctor who delivered his daughter coming to check on Theresa and not saying a word to her — only asking Mark about the latest news.

“You’re sitting there in a very happy situation for most people and dealing with that at the same time,” he said.

Theresa agreed and remembered her own similar feelings.

“I felt selfish for being happy on that day with all the devastation that was going on,” she said.

The couple’s conflict of emotions was confounded as they began making calls to family members — both to check on loved ones after the tragedy and to let them know of Brookelyn’s birth earlier that morning. The family learned a relative was stuck in Honduras because airplanes were not being allowed to enter the country. They worried, like the rest of the nation, there would be another attack. Being at a hospital in then-President Bush’s hometown, the thought crossed their minds the building could become a target.

A couple of days later, Mark and Theresa brought Brookelyn home for the first time dressed in red, white and blue.

“Coming home from the hospital, I’ll never forget all the American flags,” Theresa said. “That was a good thing to see when I went home that day — everyone showing their support, not just devastation.”

At home, the couple saved a copy of the Reporter-Telegram from the day Brookelyn was born. It was a tradition they started with their other two children, but for Brookelyn, they saved every newspaper until the 9/11 attacks slipped off the front page.

Brookelyn’s sister, Brittnie, 16, remembers her mother pulling her out of school during that time, but she was really too young to know what was going on. The oldest child, Blake, 20, has more perspective on the events.

“Growing up with it, the conversations about it in history classes are different for me,” he said. “It’s still a tragic day but for me, there are more important things. My sister was born from the ashes of the destruction.”

If you ask Brookelyn what she thinks about having been born on a day that shook the world, she just shrugs. Today is her 10th birthday and she’ll celebrate with her family and friends.

“It’s really pretty normal,” Mark said of his daughter’s birthday. “For us it became normal. We just kind of ignore it for a day and have her birthday. Her little friends come around and we don’t think about it.”

The family adheres to a strict no-TV rule on her birthday. News channels asking Americans to remember and relive the tragic events have to wait until Brookelyn goes to bed.

“She’s pretty oblivious to the whole thing,” Mark said. “Because she was born that day, there’s no memory — which is a blessing. But she’ll never see the world as we saw it before that day.”

Though the implications don’t yet register for Brookelyn, her parents can’t help but lament the fact their daughter will grow up in a country so different from the one they knew only years before.

Though Brookelyn was born in a nation at peace, the events that occured nine hours later caused the US to enter two wars, Mark said.

The couple said they’ve yet to meet another family with a child born on Sept. 11, 2001 — and it is something that comes up often in casual conversations. Every time they enroll Brookelyn in a new activity or club or fill out paper work at school or the doctor’s office, the birth date catches people’s eyes.

Recently a family member bought Brookelyn a teddy bear monogrammed with her birthday and the company where she purchased the gift called her back to check the date.

“I think that having a child born on that day keeps what happened on 9/11 fresh in our minds,” Theresa said. “It’s not a day that can come and go without thought.”

Their connection to the day has made the family more patriotic, Theresa said, and increased their support of the military. The mother of three said she dedicates Toby Keith’s patriotic hit “Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue” to her youngest daughter.

“Everyone goes on with their lives and they forget about the people who lost their lives that day and we really can’t,” she said.

As the desktop wallpaper on his computer, Mark has a photo of Brookelyn posing in front of a 9/11 flight memorial in Grapevine. The family is planning to make the drive to Alpine to visit the new memorial containing a piece of the towers.

“We’re waiting for her to get older before we take her to New York,” Theresa said.